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been published in a volume, but most of it had appeared in
periodicals; and after a good deal of persuasion Cronshaw
brought down a bundle of pages torn out of The Yellow
Book, The Saturday Review, and other journals, on each of
which was a poem. Philip was taken aback to find that most
of them reminded him either of Henley or of Swinburne. It
needed the splendour of Cronshaw’s delivery to make them
personal. He expressed his disappointment to Lawson, who
carelessly repeated his words; and next time Philip went to
the Closerie des Lilas the poet turned to him with his sleek
smile:
‘I hear you don’t think much of my verses.’
Philip was embarrassed.
‘I don’t know about that,’ he answered. ‘I enjoyed reading
them very much.’
‘Do not attempt to spare my feelings,’ returned Cronshaw,
with a wave of his fat hand. ‘I do not attach any exaggerated
importance to my poetical works. Life is there to be lived
rather than to be written about. My aim is to search out the
manifold experience that it offers, wringing from each mo-
ment what of emotion it presents. I look upon my writing as
a graceful accomplishment which does not absorb but rath-
er adds pleasure to existence. And as for posterity—damn
posterity.’
Philip smiled, for it leaped to one’s eyes that the artist in
life had produced no more than a wretched daub. Cronshaw
looked at him meditatively and filled his glass. He sent the
waiter for a packet of cigarettes.
‘You are amused because I talk in this fashion and you

Of Human Bondage